Here is someone working for the ABC, from a Labor background as Hawke’s press secretary, who has written about the rise and fall of a Labor Prime Minister with all the distortions and omissions worthy of the most disingenuous right wing hack.

There is some sign that in responding to Abbott’s threat to turn the clock back and resume the old left-right ding-dong, there is part of the government’s strategy that is conceding to it much as Labor did in the last election.